“Where’s that Rita one got to?” enquired Sister Josepha angrily. “Have you seen her, Esther?”
“No, Sister.”
“Well, will you go and have a look for her!” she ordered crossly. “I haven’t seen her for an hour. She’s up to no good, that one!”
Esther set down the basket of wet sheets and walked across the centre part of the laundry. Rita was nowhere near the rows of white enamel sinks or the huge steel machines and heavy iron mangles. The Maggies were engrossed in work, and none had seen Rita. Perhaps she was out in the sorting room or the delivery area. A sixth sense guided Esther towards the laundry
yard, where the vans were delivering their Tuesday load.
“Morning, love!” chorused the men as she passed. Esther spotted Jim Murray and a lad of about fifteen carrying the huge baskets from the boys’ school in Blackrock. “Morning, Esther! That’s a cold one!” Jim Murray always made a point of saying hello to the Maggies, unlike most of the other delivery men, who ignored them or sneered at them. She supposed it was because he was older, about thirty-five or so, and had a family of his own.
“Have you seen Rita? Sister Josepha wants her.”
The van driver seemed to hesitate. “You could try over by that storeroom on the right, but you know you shouldn’t be out in the yard without a coat or something warm. You’ll get a chill.”
She smiled at his kindness in worrying about her.
The yard was icy as she crossed the cobbles, and she pulled her cardigan round her, moving awkwardly, silently cursing Rita. It would be her fault if she fell! “Rita! Rita!” she yelled as she approached the pebbledashed storeroom. The door was closed, the narrow window too grimy to see through. The wooden door pushed in easily, at least it was a bit warmer inside. Battered baskets with gaping holes, rotten and mildewed, were stockpiled in one corner. Rusting clothes mangles, broken ironing boards and leaking tin buckets covered the floor area. There was someone else inside, she could sense it. Down the very back of the room Rita was clutching Paul, one of the van drivers, to her. He was breathing heavily, his trouser belt loose, his buttons open. The two of them were at it. Rita’s overall skirt was hitched up around her hips, her knickers thrown on the
ground, as Paul pulled her on to him, sliding himself easily into that dark-covered patch between her legs. Mortified, she watched as Paul, the handsomest and sexiest of the drivers, pushed into her friend, who was groaning aloud with pleasure, egging him on.
Esther stumbled noisily back towards the door. Rita must be stark raving mad! What if one of the nuns had come along and caught her in the act? The lovers were finishing up. Deliberately she made some noise, kicking at one of the buckets.
“Christ! There’s someone there!”
Paul pushed past her, busy tucking in his shirt and fixing his trousers. Rita stayed inside, sitting on one of the baskets, lighting up a cigarette that Paul had left her. “I’m having a smoke, Esther, if it’s any concern of yours!”
“Are you gone mad, Rita? Sister Jo-Jo could have been the one that walked in on the two of you! She sent me to look for you. What would you have done if she’d caught you?”
Rita shrugged, inhaling the cigarette smoke deeply. “She’d have seen something that she ain’t seen before,” she chuckled, “wouldn’t she?”
“I think you’re crazy! Do you love that fellah?”
Rita spluttered with laughter. “Love! That’s nothing at all to do with it! He’s just a man who wanted a good fuck and I gave it to him. Once a week I come out here and we have a good time.”
“But why?”
“‘Cos I do, that’s why! He makes me feel good and he brings me packets of ciggies and sometimes a baby bottle
of whiskey or gin. We have fun, a bit of a ride, and it’s nobody’s bloody business!”
“What if you end up having another baby? Or if the nuns find out!”
“Patrick’s my baby, Esther! You know how much I love him. Anyways Paul uses a rubber.”
Esther couldn’t think what to say. Rita was so beautiful and sexy, men were bound to fall for her and want to have sex with her. She was embarrassed discussing such things, even with someone as brazen and outspoken as Rita.
“Do you want a smoke? Though I suppose you’d better not, Esther, till after the baby. I tried to give them up when I was carrying Patrick, but I had to have one every now and then. The same goes for fucking, some days I just have to do it, d’ya know what I mean? You must have felt the same way about your fellah!”
Esther blazed: “I loved Con! That was totally different!”
“If you say so! Though your fellah obviously didn’t bother using a rubber,” giggled Rita, “or you wouldn’t be stuck in this kip with the rest of us.”
“Conor loved me!” she tried convincing herself, realizing how little she knew about the boyfriend who had fathered her child. Sex and physical attraction had been the main ingredients of their relationship.
“Well, whatever you call it, Esther, we’re all only human. That’s what landed most of us in here. It’s only the nuns and halfwits that don’t understand the whole man-woman thing. It’s just that I’m more honest than the rest
of you.” Finishing her cigarette, Rita bent to retrieve her knickers, fixing her overall as if nothing had happened, Esther realizing just how coarse her friend could be.
“Well, what does Jo-Jo want me for anyways?”
“I don’t know.”
Two or three of the drivers whistled as the girls appeared outside, Rita tossing back her mane of black hair and strutting like Marilyn Monroe. Esther was furious with her.
“See ya, boys!” Rita called, crossing the yard. “Don’t look so shocked, Esther! They’re only a crowd of men.”
Sister Josepha was waiting at the door. “Don’t give me any of your cheek, Rita. I’m not interested! Where were you? I’m waiting an age to get heavy pressing done and I’m fed up of you skiving off and leaving others to do your work. You’re lazy out!”
Esther watched the nun. She was in bad humour and gave out sharply to Rita. “This afternoon I’m reporting you to the Mother Superior.” She turned to Esther. “There’s a pile of restaurant linen that needs starching, Esther, you can attend to that!”
Esther watched as Rita followed the nun upstairs to the office. It was so strange that on her own Rita was the best in the world, but when men came into it she utterly changed.
“Get off!” screamed Sheila. “Get her off me!”
The two women rolled around in the narrow corridor outside the laundry.
Rita had grabbed Sheila by her short ginger hair and was all but swinging out of her.
“Mind your own shagging business in the future, Miss Know-it-all. You got me into trouble with Jo-Jo today and I ended up being hauled up in front of Gabriel too.”
“I did nothing!” screamed Sheila. “I only asked Jo-Jo if someone could help me with some pressing.”
“You sent a bleeding search party out for me!”
“Why, where were you anyways?” The other girl smirked.
Rita let go of her hair, shoving her towards the others as she turned to walk away.
“She were with a fellah,” jeered Kathleen. “I saw them out in the yard.”
“Up to her usual tricks.”
“Take that back!”
“Why? I bet it’s the truth! Everyone here knows what you are.”
“Go on then!” screeched Rita, grabbing at Sheila again, almost tugging the hair from her scalp.
“You’re on the game! You’re a bloody slut and everybody knows it!”
“How dare you, you ginger-haired bitch!”
“Men pay you to have sex with them! It’s filthy and disgusting!”
“Listen to Miss High-and-mighty. She couldn’t get it quick enough herself, had to get a train up to Belfast after the American soldier boy, a right Yankee-doodle-dandy. He gave you that and all, your Yankee soldier, before he pissed off back to his wife in Alabama or Texas or wherever he was from!”
“You shagging tart! It wasn’t like that, it was a wartime romance. His unit was posted here during the Emergency. He was a good man, handsome, kind, ’twas nobody’s fault that he were posted overseas. He was a soldier, and he had to follow orders. We loved each other, but it was just the war, everything was different then.”
“Leave her be, Rita!” cautioned Bernice.
“At least I get paid when I drop my drawers,” jeered Rita. “I’m not stupid, like some—”
“Ah, will ya stop that fighting the two of you!” pleaded Detta. “You’re getting on my nerves! Everyone in this place has got secrets and there’s no use going around calling each other bad names! It doesn’t do one darned bit of good! We are all doing our penance as it is.”
Esther agreed with Detta, and tried hard not to be judgemental, no matter what she heard or saw. After all, she was in no position to look down on anyone or call them names. The Maggies were all here for the same reason. No one else gave a damn about them.